Why was the interstate projects proposed in the 1991 ISTEA act such flops?

[planxtymcgillicuddy]

The only two of the majors corridors visualized in this that actually got built to its full, original vision was I-22 and I-41. I-49, I-69, I-73 & I-74 exist in several widely spaced sections, I-27 will likely never go past Amarillo and Lubbock, I-86 aint going further east than Binghamton anytime soon, whatever the hell I-99 was supposed to be, the mystical unicorn that was I-66, the proposed I-83 routing down U.S. 29 in Virginia and North Carolina never came to be, etc. Why did these projects dry up and die? Was it a lack of foresight? Did the Great Recession put the kibosh on these projects? Was there simply no desire to finish them, particularly 73 & 74? Was it a mix of all 3? Discuss.....

[LM117]

The simplest answer is a combination of the states being responsible for the majority, if not all, of the funding, a lack of political will in some cases, and states needing to focus on projects that may be more important elsewhere.

Personally, I don't think Congress should designate future interstates unless they provide the majority, if not all, of the funding.

[planxtymcgillicuddy]

The simplest answer is a combination of the states being responsible for the majority, if not all, of the funding, a lack of political will in some cases, and states needing to focus on projects that may be more important elsewhere.

Personally, I don't think Congress should designate future interstates unless they provide the majority, if not all, of the funding.

Agreed. One reason why I'm in favor of reintroducing the 90/10 rule

[Beltway]

the proposed I-83 routing down U.S. 29 in Virginia and North Carolina

The route number came from roads enthusiasts, not an official source.  It is a high priority corridor but not a future Interstate highway corridor.

During the development of the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act legislation (ISTEA of 1991, the federal 7-year transportation bill), Virginia, along with North Carolina, worked successfully to have US-29 designated as a "Highway of National Significance."  This designation means that the U.S. Congress considers the US-29 corridor to be an important corridor that is not adequately served by the Interstate Highway System, and therefore, it requires further highway development to serve the travel and economic development needs of the region.

[3467]

Some corridors like Avenue  of Saints  were in it but were not envisioned as Interstates and some were finished some not. Rodney Slater wanted a visionary post interstate system based on the National Highway System. His plan was a system of high design roads that would be a post interstate system . They could be expressways or well designed 2 lanes with passing lanes. Sadly there was never a consistent design standard and as mentioned never the funding.
Even worse the NHS  just became the FAP. Over half of Illinois numbered roads are on it so it doesn't mean much. It's sad it could have been the most important bill since the interstates.

[Rothman]

The simplest answer is a combination of the states being responsible for the majority, if not all, of the funding, a lack of political will in some cases, and states needing to focus on projects that may be more important elsewhere.

Personally, I don't think Congress should designate future interstates unless they provide the majority, if not all, of the funding.

Agreed. One reason why I'm in favor of reintroducing the 90/10 rule

Well...someone hasn't understood federal transportation acts...

The 90/10 rule still exists for NHPP funding and has since the big fund source switcheroo in MAP-21 back in 2012.  So, I don't know exactly what you're getting at there.  Even before MAP-21, IM was the fund source dedicated for interstates at 90/10.  In any matter, the 90/10 rule has not meant more money for new interstates, either then or post MAP-21 -- at least not in any act I can think of -- perhaps going all the way back to ISTEA (and definitely not since SAFETEA-LU).  Congress and FHWA have mostly just handed out funding that is interstate-eligible and left it up to the states as to whether they will build new with it or maintain their current systems.

In any matter, the 90/10 rule already exists and has for quite some time.  The only way to increase funding for new construction would be for Congress to set up a specific fund source to do so.

[sparker]

Seeing as how the '91 ISTEA act was the first large-scale "omnibus" highway legislation to be enacted after the '73 Nixonian effort to effectively eliminate "top-down" federal planning of such things in favor of state/local-initiated efforts,  with block grants as the method to do so, it's likely that Congressional representatives simply "went to town" with the new high priority corridor format and attempted to cram as many long-simmering project ideas as possible into that years' legislation.   However, it wasn't until four years later, with the NHS legislation of '95, that the process of attaching legislated Interstate designations to the new corridors was done (I-69, I-73/74, and I-99 emerged from that year's bill).  But without any dedicated funding source for any or all of these corridors, most of them simply languished over time unless there were already acceptable (or close!) facilities already built along the newly designated corridors (cf. I-22's  MS section and much of the southern end of I-99).   Local political will became the main factor as to whether actual deployment occurred post-legislation; some jurisdictions (famously NC and TX) actively supported the new corridors, while others either delayed or ignored these "paper" routings.   That brought about actual work on corridors with broad support (I-49's AR and MO completed sections and the remainder of I-22 -- after the Trent Lott/Bill Frist "pissing match" threatened to stop progress there before Sen. Richard Shelby resuscitated the corridor).   Other corridors from the first two omnibus programs were decidedly "mixed bags";  I-73 & the I-74 extension found palpable support in NC, some support (albeit not bolstered by money) in SC, and halting support in VA.   Nevertheless, supporters of new Interstate mileage were just getting their "sea legs" with the '91 and '95 acts, leading to bold (I-11) and even questionable (I-14) proposals finding their way into ensuing legislation.   But the '95 NHS act is notable inasmuch as it broke ground regarding the attachment of Interstate designations to corridor legislation as a way to get additional corridors offically recognized if not fully realized -- something only hinted at with '91's ISTEA.  It could be argued that while it marked the first Congressional-designate method -- new I-corridors within large-scale national legislation, the other shoe dropped back in 2004 when I-22 was officially designated along with HPC #45 -- which was simply inserted into the FY '04-'05 authorization bill.  This then became the "default" method, used with just about every new Interstate addition -- trunk or 3di -- after that point.   However, without the HPC "vehicle" introduced in 1991, the arduous method of going through AASHTO and, of course, FHWA to get designations approved would still be the more common approach -- and many if not most of the Interstates commissioned after that time would not exist.       

[Henry]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

[NE2]

ISTEA did not add anything to the Interstate Highway System. The first additions were in the National Highway System Designation Act of 1995:

"˜(5)INCLUSION OF CERTAIN ROUTE SEGMENTS ON INTERSTATE SYSTEM-

                "˜(A) IN GENERAL- The portions of the routes referred to in clauses (i), (ii), and (iii) of subsection (c)(5)(B), in subsection (c)(9), and in subsections (c)(18) and (c)(20) that are not a part of the Interstate System are designated as future parts of the Interstate System. Any segment of such routes shall become a part of the Interstate System at such time as the Secretary determines that the segment--

                    "˜(i) meets the Interstate System design standards approved by the Secretary under section 109(b) of title 23, United States Code; and

                    "˜(ii) connects to an existing Interstate System segment.

            The portion of the route referred to in subsection (c)(9) is designated as Interstate Route I-99.

This is I-73/74 south of Portsmouth, I-99 from Bedford to Corning, and I-69. Of these, only part of I-73/74 is totally dead.

[vdeane]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

A lot of that is money.  If you passed some law that gave the states all the money they need to finish their corridors, on top of the regular amount of money, and only to finish those interstates (so on top of their other projects, not instead of them), most of those examples would be built.  The only ones that wouldn't would be I-73/74 in OH/MI.  WV was all set to build I-74 until FHWA said they had to use the more expensive process of doing a regular contract for the earthwork rather than telling the coal companies to leave the mountains ready for paving once their done strip mining the coal.  The other projects aren't dead, just moving extraordinarily slowly or waiting for other, more important, projects to finish.

[hbelkins]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

A lot of that is money.  If you passed some law that gave the states all the money they need to finish their corridors, on top of the regular amount of money, and only to finish those interstates (so on top of their other projects, not instead of them), most of those examples would be built.  The only ones that wouldn't would be I-73/74 in OH/MI.  WV was all set to build I-74 until FHWA said they had to use the more expensive process of doing a regular contract for the earthwork rather than telling the coal companies to leave the mountains ready for paving once their done strip mining the coal.  The other projects aren't dead, just moving extraordinarily slowly or waiting for other, more important, projects to finish.

And West Virginia wasn't going to build it as an interstate, but at an at-grade expressway similar to the APD corridors.

[vdeane]

My impression is that it was going to be an interstate until FHWA told them they couldn't do this, and that they then decided "then why should we spend the extra money to make it interstate standards when the feds won't let us sign an interstate on it unless we spend even more money".  I'm pretty sure that they're still having the coal companies do the earthwork for the King Coal Highway.

[hbelkins]

My impression is that it was going to be an interstate until FHWA told them they couldn't do this, and that they then decided "then why should we spend the extra money to make it interstate standards when the feds won't let us sign an interstate on it unless we spend even more money".  I'm pretty sure that they're still having the coal companies do the earthwork for the King Coal Highway.

Nope. There's a school (the new Mingo County high school) on the portion of the route that's open between WV 65 and the WV 44 connector. US 52 in WV was always planned to be a surface expressway.

[Bitmapped]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

I-73/I-74 in WV and the southern part of I-99 haven't been put on hold or cancelled because of opposition. They aren't being built because of a lack of a dedicated funding source and the states having higher priority needs for their available federal dollars.

My impression is that it was going to be an interstate until FHWA told them they couldn't do this, and that they then decided "then why should we spend the extra money to make it interstate standards when the feds won't let us sign an interstate on it unless we spend even more money".  I'm pretty sure that they're still having the coal companies do the earthwork for the King Coal Highway.

Nope. There's a school (the new Mingo County high school) on the portion of the route that's open between WV 65 and the WV 44 connector. US 52 in WV was always planned to be a surface expressway.

The portions of the King Coal Highway that have been/will be built are being done in conjunction with mining projects. That hasn't changed. As H.B. has said, WV never really intended for it to be a freeway. It was always going to be an APD Corridor-style at-grade expressway.

[ftballfan]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

I-73/I-74 in WV and the southern part of I-99 haven't been put on hold or cancelled because of opposition. They aren't being built because of a lack of a dedicated funding source and the states having higher priority needs for their available federal dollars.

My impression is that it was going to be an interstate until FHWA told them they couldn't do this, and that they then decided "then why should we spend the extra money to make it interstate standards when the feds won't let us sign an interstate on it unless we spend even more money".  I'm pretty sure that they're still having the coal companies do the earthwork for the King Coal Highway.

Nope. There's a school (the new Mingo County high school) on the portion of the route that's open between WV 65 and the WV 44 connector. US 52 in WV was always planned to be a surface expressway.

The portions of the King Coal Highway that have been/will be built are being done in conjunction with mining projects. That hasn't changed. As H.B. has said, WV never really intended for it to be a freeway. It was always going to be an APD Corridor-style at-grade expressway.

Even a corridor-standard expressway would still be a massive improvement over the curvy two-lane roads

[hbelkins]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

g
I-73/I-74 in WV and the southern part of I-99 haven't been put on hold or cancelled because of opposition. They aren't being built because of a lack of a dedicated funding source and the states having higher priority needs for their available federal dollars.

Plus, as has been documented elsewhere, Pennsylvania specifically requested the Bedford-to-Cumberland portion of US 220 (I-99) to be removed from the APD system, and that money transferred to use elsewhere. I think possibly a portion of US 322, but I'm not positive. At any rate, there will probably never be any improvements to that stretch of US 220. A few places could use minor realignment or widening, and some turning lanes and passing lanes in spots would be welcome. There also needs to be some work done just north of the state line. I've been on that stretch several times, and it has a decent amount of truck traffic for a rural two-lane. It probably doesn't need to be an interstate. Four lanes would be nice, but a two-lane with turning and passing lanes in places would probably suffice. Seems to me that would be a worthwhile expenditure of PennDOT funds, even without APD or other federal funding.

[sparker]

It all comes down to one thing: opposition! WV is not turning US 52 into I-73/I-74 anytime soon, and OH and MI also said no to I-73. Plus LA, AR, MS and TN are putting their respective I-69 projects on hold for now, which is why you see a bunch of disconnected segments from Indianapolis to Laredo/McAllen/Brownsville.

g
I-73/I-74 in WV and the southern part of I-99 haven't been put on hold or cancelled because of opposition. They aren't being built because of a lack of a dedicated funding source and the states having higher priority needs for their available federal dollars.

Plus, as has been documented elsewhere, Pennsylvania specifically requested the Bedford-to-Cumberland portion of US 220 (I-99) to be removed from the APD system, and that money transferred to use elsewhere. I think possibly a portion of US 322, but I'm not positive. At any rate, there will probably never be any improvements to that stretch of US 220. A few places could use minor realignment or widening, and some turning lanes and passing lanes in spots would be welcome. There also needs to be some work done just north of the state line. I've been on that stretch several times, and it has a decent amount of truck traffic for a rural two-lane. It probably doesn't need to be an interstate. Four lanes would be nice, but a two-lane with turning and passing lanes in places would probably suffice. Seems to me that would be a worthwhile expenditure of PennDOT funds, even without APD or other federal funding.

The funds that were originally slated for I-99/ARC corridor "O" from Bedford, PA south to I-68 east of Cumberland were intended, post-transfer, to be used for an auxiliary corridor "O-1", which was to follow US 322 west of I-99 (there are high-speed freeway ramps to and from northward I-99 as part of this project) as far as Woodland, where it would turn north a few miles to terminate at I-80.  The purpose here was to provide a "shortcut" from the western reaches of I-80 to the State College area without having to backtrack through Bellefonte on I-99.  At the time the transfer was made (IIRC circa 2001) there was some speculation that this would be "I-199".  But so far the only funds spent were for the US 322 (west) interchange with I-99.  In a related vein, Maryland DOT jumped the gun a bit by constructing an expandable 2-lane expressway along US 220 from I-68 to the PA state line in anticipation of their portion of the freeway (until PA threw them under the bus, so to speak) -- at least they didn't spend $$$ on a high-speed interchange at I-68; it remains a simple diamond.   

[Beltway]

Maryland DOT jumped the gun a bit by constructing an expandable 2-lane expressway along US 220 from I-68 to the PA state line in anticipation of their portion of the freeway (until PA threw them under the bus, so to speak) -- at least they didn't spend $$$ on a high-speed interchange at I-68; it remains a simple diamond.   

That is somewhat different from the actual.  I have public meeting brochures for that project from 1984, 1990 and 1993.

U.S. Route 220 From U.S. Route 48 East of Cumberland to the Pennsylvania State Line.

From the 1984 brochure:
This project has been under study intermittently since the 1970s.  A controlled access, four lane, freeway was originally envisioned from U.S. Route 30 in Pennsylvania as part of the Appalachian Development Highway System Program.  The proposed improvement was downscaled to a two lane, partially controlled access facility, terminating near the state line, in 1977 to reflect Pennsylvania's withdrawal from the study due to fiscal reasons.

So they built it as a 2-lane highway on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.  US-220 used to go thru the center of the city on city streets, and this project in conjunction with I-68 provides a high-speed bypass of the city for US-220.

[sparker]

Maryland DOT jumped the gun a bit by constructing an expandable 2-lane expressway along US 220 from I-68 to the PA state line in anticipation of their portion of the freeway (until PA threw them under the bus, so to speak) -- at least they didn't spend $$$ on a high-speed interchange at I-68; it remains a simple diamond.   

That is somewhat different from the actual.  I have public meeting brochures for that project from 1984, 1990 and 1993.

U.S. Route 220 From U.S. Route 48 East of Cumberland to the Pennsylvania State Line.

From the 1984 brochure:
This project has been under study intermittently since the 1970s.  A controlled access, four lane, freeway was originally envisioned from U.S. Route 30 in Pennsylvania as part of the Appalachian Development Highway System Program.  The proposed improvement was downscaled to a two lane, partially controlled access facility, terminating near the state line, in 1977 to reflect Pennsylvania's withdrawal from the study due to fiscal reasons.

So they built it as a 2-lane highway on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.  US-220 used to go thru the center of the city on city streets, and this project in conjunction with I-68 provides a high-speed bypass of the city for US-220.

So it was actually a local "SIU" reroute to get US 220 out of north Cumberland rather than an integral part of a now-defunct corridor concept?   Either way, the fact that it was built on a 4-lane ROW attests to MDOT's belief that PA was still intending to expand their section of 220 whether or not it remained part of the ARC network.  The I-99 process was a "layered" affair -- a HPC (#9) was laid atop ARC Corridor "O" in 1991 via the original ISTEA legislation; the Interstate designation was added 4 years later with the follow-up NHS bill; and PA didn't pull up stakes south of Bedford until several years after that occurred; and since the HPC -- and thence the Interstate -- language specified that it was to overlay Corridor "O", which now terminated at Bedford, everything got truncated in one fell swoop.  But at least MD got something out of their part of the whole affair -- an effective N-S Cumberland bypass!  Still, a limited-access Cumberland-Bedford facility would have actually enhanced the rationale for I-99 by including a large portion of WV as a source/destination for its traffic (via I-68 and I-79,of course).     

[Beltway]

So they built it as a 2-lane highway on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.  US-220 used to go thru the center of the city on city streets, and this project in conjunction with I-68 provides a high-speed bypass of the city for US-220.

So it was actually a local "SIU" reroute to get US 220 out of north Cumberland rather than an integral part of a now-defunct corridor concept?   

Appears that way.

Either way, the fact that it was built on a 4-lane ROW attests to MDOT's belief that PA was still intending to expand their section of 220 whether or not it remained part of the ARC network.

It said [PA] "withdrawal from the study due to fiscal reasons," in 1977.  That was when PennDOT's biggest crunch occurred financially, many projects were canceled. 

It didn't say that it was withdrawn from the ADHS.

Maryland has build numbers of 2-lane highways on 4-lane rights-of-way, long before they were widened to 4-lanes.  For example most of MD-404 between US-50 and Denton, built probably in the 1960s and just dualized in 2018.

[sparker]

So they built it as a 2-lane highway on a 4-lane limited access right-of-way.  US-220 used to go thru the center of the city on city streets, and this project in conjunction with I-68 provides a high-speed bypass of the city for US-220.

So it was actually a local "SIU" reroute to get US 220 out of north Cumberland rather than an integral part of a now-defunct corridor concept?   Either way, the fact that it was built on a 4-lane ROW attests to MDOT's belief that PA was still intending to expand their section of 220 whether or not it remained part of the ARC network.

It said [PA] "withdrawal from the study due to fiscal reasons," in 1977.  That was when PennDOT's biggest crunch occurred financially, many projects were canceled. 

It didn't say that it was withdrawn from the ADHS.

Maryland has build numbers of 2-lane highways on 4-lane rights-of-way, long before they were widened to 4-lanes.  For example most of MD-404 between US-50 and Denton, built probably in the 1960s and just dualized in 2018.

Correct; the ADHS classification wasn't withdrawn for Cumberland-Bedford until around 2001, when PA, as cited above, requested transfer of mileage (and potential funding) to corridor O-1 for reasons also cited upthread.   And I've seen the MD 2-lane-on-4-lane-ROW concept personally traversing the reaches of MD 32 west of the existing freeway facility (always though that would be a dandy reroute of I-70 if upgraded to appropriate standards).